1:31 PM — Musician Rufus Wainwright has described a "very manly" tone to his seventh studio album, after always putting on "a lavish spectacle". Wainwright became a father earlier this year, after having a baby with Leonard Cohen's daughter.

11:46 AM — Equalities Minister Lynne Featherstone said the government plans to work "with schools, businesses and communities so that together, we can drive change and help consign transphobia to the past.”

11:06 AM — A presidential campaign advert released this week by Rick Perry depicts him saying there is "something wrong with our country" when gays can serve in the military, but children cannot "celebrate Christmas or pray in school".

10:25 AM — The Australian government has lifted a ban which hindered the ability of gay couples to marry overseas. Julia Gillard's ministers have reversed a policy which meant gay couples were not able to receive a certificate confirming their eligibility to marry.

10:04 AM — Whose voice has the most authority on Twitter when it comes to LGBT life? PinkNews.co.uk has teamed up with PeerIndex to draw up a list, and we need your nominations: simply tweet your nominees' usernames and the hashtag #pinkpeople2011.

7th December 2011

4:26 PM — The Church's General Synod has said it is currently bound by the canons which define marriage as being between a man and a woman, but said it has not yet had time to run a "full debate" on the issue of gay marriage internally.

12:15 PM — An inquest into the death of Roger Crouch, the anti-gay bullying campaigner who was honoured for his work protecting teenagers from homophobic bullying after his son committed suicide last year, has heard he was found hanged.

11:42 AM — Hillary Clinton has delivered a groundbreaking speech to a United Nations summit in Geneva following the US' declaration that its agencies will challenge the criminalisation of gay acts and identity overseas.

11:04 AM — US presidential candidate Rick Santorum told a group on his campaign trail in Iowa that gay marriage would damage "family and faith" by forcing schools to teach children about gay and straight relationships equally.

9:46 AM — New instructions issued by the Obama administration call for US government agencies to consider gay rights when deciding aid and asylum cases. It is the first US government strategy dedicated to combating rights abuses against gay people abroad.

9:28 AM — Elio Di Rupo has been named the new, openly gay, Prime Minister of Belgium, after the country went a year and a half without a government. He will become the second openly gay head of government in Europe.

6th December 2011

3:26 PM — The head of a US school has intervened to ensure students carry on singing the original lyrics to the Christmas carol "Deck the Halls". A music teacher in Michigan took the decision to replace the phrase "gay apparel" with "bright apparel" after children found the word funny and she struggled to maintain control over them.

1:28 PM — A petition has been launched asking the government to issue a formal pardon to the gay mathematician Alan Turing. Turing, who worked at Bletchley Park during the World War Two, was prosecuted for his sexual orientation in 1952 and obliged to undergo chemical castration. He committed suicide two years later, aged 41.

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